The effect of voters previously stated preference regarding the issue

In IR questions that includes tables, charts or graphs, it's important to understand what the data "means." Based on the chart and the description next to it, here's what you should notice:

1) There are 5 political parties (including "no preference") and each has a line on the graph.
2) The lines represent the probability that a party members vote the SAME as their preference.
3) Preferences vary from "against" to "for" with 3 options "in the middle"
4) Individual data points will tell you the probability that one's "vote" matches one's "preference." For example, in the Delta party, if you look at the point that is farthest to the right, it tells you that about 80% of the Delta members whose preference is "for" the issue actually vote "for" the issue (and by deduction, about 20% vote in a way that differs from their preference).

The drop-down questions that follow ask you to look for "trending" data in the chart.

Q1 The party that is MOST apt to vote according to the preference (e.g. how they vote matches what they prefer). We'd be looking for an overall line that has a high percentage. Overall, the Delta line is above the other lines (except for one spot). THAT line is most apt to vote according to its preference.

Q2 The part that is MOST apt to vote AGAINST the policy IF the presence is to vote AGAINST. Here, we're looking for a specific point that has a high percent for the AGAINST option. The highest point is on the Zeta line

1. Members of the_____________party are most apt to vote according to their previously stated preference regarding the issue of working-time reduction.
What's asked is which teams previously stated reference/actual preference is the highest, => which party voted for in the previously stated reference and in the actual preference.
=> the probability for such team would be highest.
Thus, we can infer from the graph, that the probability is maximum for Delta party (~ 0.8).

Answer C.


2. Members of the______________party are most apt to vote against the issue of working-time reduction if their previously stated preference regarding the issue of working-time reduction was also against.

The party which would be most apt to vote against, would be which has a higher probability in against and a lesser one in for.
From the graph,we can infer that the in case of against the Zeta has the highest probability which goes from 0.70 to 0.45, => Zeta's party members are most apt to vote against if their previous vote was also against.

Answer D.

1)C,Delta will be chosen as most apt party since it's graph is rising towards the for area with the maximum value when compared with that of other parties.

2)D,Zeta are most apt for working against since they are having highest preference in that area,when looking at their past

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1.
We need to find out most apt to vote according to previous stated preference
Sigma(~0.55)
Theta(0.60)
Delta(0.80)
Zeta(0.70)

So answer is C


2.most opt to vote against
A. Sigma (0.55)
B. Theta (0.60)
C. Delta(0.60)
D. Zeta (0.70)

answer is D

What is the meaning of this sentence?
How does one use this information to answerthe questions?

chetan2u GMATNinja VeritasPrepBrian

GMATNinja GMATNinja2 need your help to understand the ques.

bm2201

I have a doubt in Q1, when we say previously stated pref. how do we know if it was for or against

Pls clarify!

Hi guys, completely confused with the graph. Can someone please help explain how to interpret the graph?

It does not matter what were their preferences For or Against.

There are two points:
- The graph shows the effect of voters’ previously stated preference regarding the issue of working-time reduction
- You have to choose Party, whose members most apt to vote according to their previously stated preference regarding the issue of working-time reduction.

In other words what party has the highest probability ?

Concerning the you doubts, if Zeta depicted the highest number Against for instance 85% in lieu of 70% , then Zeta would be a leader.

GMATNinja GMATNinja2 need your help to understand the ques.

Same here. Can't understand the solutions if graph interpretation isn't understood. Assistance appreciated

AndrewN Can you please decipher this? Not sure what they're trying to say here.

Hello, AlphaCentauri4ly. I spent a bit of time myself deciphering the first question, but then the task was easy. I will outline my thought process below.


The graph itself provides two pieces of information under the title "Working-Time Reduction":

• probability of vote
• issue preference (for/against)

We can see that there are four different parties, in addition to a group labeled "No Preference." The only part of the question stem that remains enigmatic is previously stated preference. If I cannot find such information directly in the graph, I consult the paragraph above it. Here, the first line provides the key information:


Basically, the y-axis indicates the probability that preference will match vote. (Remember, a probability can only go to 1.00, or 100 percent.) Now, since the question asks us to find the party most apt to vote according to its preference, we are simply looking to identify the group with the strongest correlation on the y-axis. You can go through each data point if you prefer:


We can see that Delta has the highest overall correlation, not only by average, but also by individual point, so there can be little doubt that the answer is (C).

Since we put in the legwork for the first question, the second one ought to be easy.


Boiled down, this question is looking for the group with the strongest correlation between against (preference) and against (vote). The x-axis tells us that those most strongly against the issue, by preference, lie to the left, and if we look at that left-most data point for each group, we get the following:


Since the highest value is 0.70, the group we are looking for must be Zeta, and the answer is (D).

The phrasing of both questions sounds a bit formal or antiquated—apt to is not in common usage, although it might appear in a newspaper story or a book.

Perhaps that sheds some light on the matter. Thank you for thinking to ask, and good luck with your studies.

- Andrew

Thank you ANDREW. I misconstrued the first question to be asking which group is "most consistent" in voting for their stated preference, so I marked 'A'. The language does seem a little archaic and cryptic. I was lost in the wordiness of the prompt.

I really think this graph makes no sense.

Would it be fair to say the X-Axis is (interpolating the values):
Against
Leans Against
Undecided
Leans For
For

That would suggest that the Zeta middle point at 0.60 means "60% of the cohort that is the intersection of Zeta party and undecided voted undecided" which makes no sense at all.
The only way the chart makes sense if the Y axis was a probability of a "for" or "against" vote.

This question should be replaced.

Hi AndrewN,

Would you please help to explain the graph? Take Delta Group for example, I don't understand about why we have 5 data points (perhaps time-series) and how to interpret those points (except for the first and last: 1. against 0.6, for 0.4; 5. against 0.2, for 0.8).

Thank you

Hello, tinbq. If we look at the five values for Delta listed in the graph from left to right, we get, approximately, 0.60—0.69—0.73—0.78—0.81. According to the y-axis, these numbers correspond to the probability of a Delta party member casting a vote. But you should be asking yourself, What kind of vote? The x-axis tells us: a preference for or against an issue. Since there are five dashes on the x-axis, we can reasonably interpret the middle one as neutral. The one on the far left is against, so the one in between that and the center dash is likely moderately against or something similar. We can apply the same logic to the right side, in which the dashes would be moderately for and for. Putting it all together, then, we can reasonably interpret the information for Delta party members as follows:

0.60—the probability of a given member who feels strongly against an issue casting a vote against that issue

0.69—the probability of a given member who feels moderately against an issue casting a vote against that issue

0.73—the probability of a given member who feels neutral about an issue casting a vote on that issue (whether for or against)

0.78—the probability of a given member who feels moderately for an issue casting a vote for that issue

0.81—the probability of a given member who feels strongly for an issue casting a vote for that issue

Thus, there appears to be a strong correlation between the preference a Delta party member has indicated and the vote that person eventually casts concerning that issue. No other range of probabilities shows as high a correlation. (Zeta would be second, with correlations between 0.70 and about 0.47. Apparently, these party members are more apt to vote if they are against an issue.)

Perhaps the graph makes more sense now. These IR questions take some getting used to, but do not worry about speed, especially at first. Take the time to understand them as best you can, and you will find that subsequent questions do not seem as challenging. Good luck with your studies.

- Andrew

Hi ANDREW,

Thank you so much for your explanation. This is my first time seeing this graph, which is complicated by its wordings. If the narrative simply says that the graph shows the correlation between predicted and actual vote as you explained, then things would be much easier.